


All the King's Pieces

by Scottie_Dont



Category: Original Work
Genre: Alice in Wonderland References, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Mythology, Alternate Universe - Steampunk, Alternate Universe - Victorian, Disabled Character, Fantasy, Mythology References, NaNoWriMo, Original Character Death(s), Original Character-centric, Original Mythology, Steampunk, Victorian
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-11-25
Updated: 2015-11-28
Packaged: 2018-05-03 08:21:29
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5283593
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Scottie_Dont/pseuds/Scottie_Dont
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Gideon was nothing more than a student until his Professor sent a strange gentleman to retrieve him with a curious summons. In the subsequent meeting, he discovers that the gentleman is far more than he appeared, his Professor has harbored a dark secret. Before Gideon's eyes, his beloved Professor is killed by men working for the mysterious 'Red King', dropping the burden of the Professor's secret on Gideon along with all the trouble that goes with it. Hunted by the Red King, Gideon runs with the mysterious Gentlemen and a rag-tag team of allies, all while attempting to figure out what the Red King is really after, who the Red King really is and what it was that the Professor was trying to protect. In the process, the group assembled by the late Professor falls apart. On his own, Gideon is quickly caught by the Red King - who has a face he knows. In the end, Gideon must make a choice; and he chooses to let the King lose his head. After all, the Red King has already lost his mind.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Sacrifice

**Author's Note:**

> This is my second attempt at NaNo. I will be posting up the first few chapters to see how well it goes over in attempt to find some motivation to maybe go on to the editing stage to attempt to really get this out in the world. So please, keep an open mind as you read, and, most importantly, enjoy!

            Beyond the reflections of one world lay another, one that was not out of touch in the past. Things could pass freely from one world to the other, and the things that passed from the other side of the reflections into the world of men were beyond the grasp of the imagination; creatures capable of great acts of destruction and benevolence alike, creatures that could not be controlled by mortal men. Only beings from the other side of the reflections could control the creatures that passed through. In turn, men treated them as gods, as to men they were in comparison. They were unearthly in both their appearance and their magic, like men only in how they were twisted reflections of them. For a time, the god-like beings from beyond the reflections were good and lived in harmony with the mortal men, mingling with them and becoming of them.

            Great power, however, is known to corrupt greatly, and the beings were not immune to such corruption. The darkness that had spread over the world they’d left behind reached through the reflections to those in the world of men, corrupting them and those creatures they controlled. Upon the world they released chaos and destruction as they saw fit. They punished men with floods, with fire and with ice for even the most minor indiscretions. They fought amongst themselves for more power. The fathers of them were killed by their sons and brothers by brothers. Through it all it was the men, mortal and of the world the reflections had entered, who suffered. In their suffering, men became bitter. The power struggles between gods became wars against them as men rose up to take their world back. Magic gained and learned over the years by the priests was used against the very gods who had taught them the secrets to it. The children of gods by men and men by gods chose sides as the world became divided. They were forced to choose between the great magic of the reflected gods with their desire for control and the weaker magics of the men who desired peace.

            A great priest, a son of god and man, forced the reflected back to their world beyond. It was an action meant to bring the wars to an end, to bring peace. He and the other priests sought to use what magic they could against the world beyond and all it contained in order to keep them from the world of men. To give men back the world which had been theirs from the beginning. They sought to lock all the evil that went with the magic and power from beyond the reflections back from whence they came.

            The only way to do that was with the magic of both worlds, with the ways of the gods they were trying so hard to lock out. The men were wise from the wars fought against their gods with sticks and stones, they knew the gods and their creatures would try to return. The peace would not last and the darkness would seep back through the gates of the reflections. There was no seal that could be created that would not one day break, so as they set the seals, they bound them to the world and set in place protections. They wove it all together with magic mixed of both worlds, magic that would be the last remains of the world beyond the reflection. For these protections the priests only sought out the strongest, only those who had proven themselves against the reflections.

            Among those chosen was a man unlike the others. Where nearly every son of man by man or man by reflected god had eyes like earth, he had eyes like the sky at light; a bright, clear blue. There were very few with eyes like his. The only others he knew were his mother and some of his sisters and brothers. Those eyes that were so unique to his mother and her children were why the priest of his tribe had chosen him, why the gathering of priests from all the local tribes had chosen him. He would be their Guardian. It was he they would entrust with the remains of reflected magic in their world, entrust him to protect them and watch the gates between the worlds until the darkness beyond breached to return. One of the last acts of combined magic would be him, their Guardian.

            In the days prior to that final act, he was worshipped much like the gods had been before they’d been corrupted by the darkness. To the Guardian was given food and drink, the best that could be gathered, and it burned his throat and put his mind in a haze. If he tried to turn anything away it was forced upon him. In the end, it left him numb and compliant with everything that was done as the world drifted in and out of focus. All of his will had been taken from him. Where they led him, he went without resistance on unsure feet, balance disrupted by the weight of skins and furs that had been draped over him.

            When he was stopped, it was by a pair of the priests gripping his arms gently on either side of him. He stood between them, swaying in place, and listened to the echoing chants of all of the priests distorted in his ears. The priests held him up and steady as the layers of fur and skin were carefully removed from him to reveal his torso. Only once all those above his waist were removed was a rod brought against the backs of his knees, forcing them to bend and drop beneath him. His exposed knees collided against smoothed limestone with a sharp crack and stained the pale stone with crimson. Though it should have been painful, he felt nothing from the damage done. He didn’t even realize it had occurred, so out of his mind was he. The priests remained at his sides, holding him up on his knees while he stared open-mouthed at his surroundings. The proportions seemed ever shifting, and the contrast incredibly stark between the tall, polished limestone pillars topped with cross-beams with their carved, praying arms on the sides and the walls of polished, mirrored obsidian, black as night. The dance of the flames in the center of the chamber for illumination reflected off of the surfaces making the place seem all the more eerie and unnatural.

            He didn’t feel the hand grip his hair as if to pull it from its roots, nor register the grip of the priests tightening to ensure he didn’t resist. The hand on his hair tugged sharply and his head easily went back with it, bearing his throat that they’d roughly shaved in the previous days. His eyes rolled with the jerk, but he remained compliant to what they did to him as he was lost in the unearthly vision of the chamber around him and the distorted chanting. He hadn’t at all realized that he had been a lamb led to slaughter, not even as the stone blade was put to his bared throat. He simply tried to focus on the expanse of black above him, an endless abyss of it.

            All he felt was the tension in the skin at the front of his neck release, making the position his head was held in no strain at all. Then his head was dropped back down as it had been, his hair released, and then his arms, letting them fall limp to his sides. There he stood on his knees, fresh crimson rolling down over his chest. The first sound he registered as coming from himself was a wet sort of gurgling bubbling up from his own throat. Everything around him began to dim as cold started to set in and the chanting grew distant. His numb body began to feel as though it were detached from him, but it remained standing on its knees, unnatural as the red began to drip to the floor. The chamber around him faded and darkened, his blue eyes rolling back in his head.

            Even after the dark had taken him from his body, leaving it cold and empty, it still stood up on its knees. It was as a puppet whose strings had not been cut, kneeling in a pool of lost life that spread over the stone slowly as the chamber was sealed. Every obsidian wall reflected the gory and unnatural scene as it remained frozen, still aside from the dancing of the flames as their color changed. As red and orange turned to cold silver and white, the line of gore across the throat slowly started to slide closed, sealing into a thin, wholly unnatural line.


	2. The Student

            The limitations of the body did not, and should not, inflict limitations on the mind. A body bound should by no means bind the mind, stunt the imagination or hamper the curiosity of the soul trapped within. If anything, it should encourage the pursuit of knowledge and lend fuel to both the imagination and curiosity. To have it simply put, just because one’s body may be lacking or limited, it is no excuse for one’s soul or mind to be.

            That was a philosophy which had been applied to young master Morgenstern by both his father, and, more recently, one of his professors at the university. Both men had further added that with the resources that the young man had access to there was absolutely no excuse that he should ever fail to apply himself or stretch his mind. If he’d been grudging to accept such a philosophy and the encouragement that went with it from his father, he was happy to accept the same from Professor Singh. Indeed, he greatly preferred what the professor had to offer in ways of knowledge and wisdom than what his father did, even if they were fundamentally the same. Professor Singh’s way of putting things had always managed to inspire his student. It drove him to seek knowledge and consider a wider range of subjects, if only to attempt to match the professor in their conversations. Those conversations, held both inside and outside of the lecture halls of the university, always managed to make Gideon forget about his physical limitations, distracting his mind instead with a variety of thought and increased curiosity. Failing that, the occasionally mystical and puzzling ways that the professor put things made Gideon at least look at his situation differently.

            The lecture on that particular day at the university had been a fascinating comparison of different myths from around the world which shared certain key aspects and the wide variety of theories for the similarities. Professor Singh’s favorite subjects of study were those of mythology and philosophy, both of which he taught classes in, and both classes on which Gideon attended as regularly as he was physically able. His limitations had him in leg braces and crutches, which made leaving the hall with the rest of those who had attended the lecture incredibly difficult. He was always one of the last ones out, and the professor was always kind enough to make it seem as though it were absolutely planned that way and not simply because of Gideon’s physical limitations. That day was no different. As Gideon slowly made his way down from the rows of increasingly elevated seats to the level floor, the professor came to meet him.

            “Did you enjoy today’s lecture, Gideon? I was hoping it would inspire curiosity to further look into the various similar myths from all around the globe and compare,” Professor Singh started the conversation effortlessly as he took the student’s arm in a gentle, yet firm grip to help him. It was only the right thing to do, after all, and Gideon had found that the professor always did the right thing, always stepped up to help whomever may need it. He did it even when he was mocked for the turban he wore on his head or the state of his long beard, neither of which bothered Gideon in the slightest. His professor’s beard was nothing compared to those of some of the Rabbis that he had seen.

            “I did very much, Professor Singh. I didn’t realize so many different cultures and faiths had such similar tales,” Gideon responded, moving carefully down the stairs with the help of his professor. With every flex of his legs, the pneumatic pumps that helped to strengthen his movement hissed softly, a noise that seemed so much louder in the nearly empty lecture hall than it had when there had been more people around. It was a sound that did occasionally embarrass Gideon, though with the professor it had only been acknowledged once and never since. Then, it had been Gideon who acknowledged it, embarrassedly apologizing for the noise of them, to which the professor had been quick to dismiss it, pointing out that Gideon had no control over the vessel that had been selected for him than Professor Singh had his, no reason to apologize for things beyond one’s control.

            “It is amazing how similar different people can be, though, it is easy to understand if one believes in Darwin’s theories. In such a case, it would not be unreasonable to believe that we did not all come from one shared ancestor. If we did all come from one common place many, many, many hundreds of years ago, then why would we not share some of the same tales, especially if those tales did actually occur?” the professor proposed with amusement in his dark eyes, releasing his grip on Gideon only when the boy was once again on a flat and level surface. The amusement spread to the rest of his face, warm smile settling in, as he saw the look of thought and curiosity on Gideon. The only part of the idea that Gideon found terribly improbable was that the myths that had been claimed to have occurred had actually occurred. Many different cultures had dragons, after all, but there was absolutely no evidence they had ever existed, that they were nothing more than myth. It was also incredibly hard to believe that even though so many different groups of people had tales of lost cities that there were actually entire cities that had sunken into the waves without a trace. It was simply too incredible to believe. That kept him skeptical over things, though, he couldn’t help but consider it.

            “That could have some very incredible implications, professor, but there is no proof for any of it. If there had been a great flood or some such, there would be some sign, wouldn’t there?” he returned, looking at the professor curiously. The leaps and bounds in science and technology throughout the nineteenth century had made it possible to prove and disprove a lot by the last decade of the century. Through fossils, it had been proved that there were creatures that had roamed the Earth before men had appeared. It proved Darwin’s theories of evolution. Surely, it should have been able to discover evidence of the mythical having ever existed, of the occurrence of some great, ancient flood that had wiped out massive amounts of civilization, but it hadn’t. “And, many cultures have myths of dragons and fairies or sprites, but we have no evidence of them either.”

            “Perhaps we simply haven’t found the evidence of such creatures. Or perhaps such things are entirely works of fiction. Just because you have not seen proof yet, Gideon, does not mean that there isn’t any to be found,” Professor Singh answered him, collecting his papers from his desk while Gideon stood and watched him. It had become entirely routine for Gideon to stand and wait for the professor while he got his things. As always, once the professor was ready with all of his things collected, the two walked out together, the conversation continuing.

            “Do you sincerely believe that all of these stories have really occurred, professor? That it is possible?” Gideon found himself asking. If the professor believed in the possibility, then there was no reason for him to dismiss it in any rush. The professor knew a great deal more than Gideon, after all, and had a great deal more time in his life to have thought about it all. Furthermore, he’d never given anyone a reason to doubt his ideas since they were ideas, left open to be proved or disproved. If anything, the professor wanted whatever ideas he put out into the world to be tried, to be questioned, to be studied and proven right or wrong. It was more about the pursuit of knowledge than being correct. Though, the professor did know a great deal more than most other people, especially when it came to the fantastic.

            “I do, Gideon, I do indeed believe that all of the stories that have been shared between so many cultures must have some basis in truth, as everything does. Though, I think an entire discussion on such a topic may have to wait until our next visit off of University grounds when we have plenty of time,” the professor told his student, giving him a friendly pat on the shoulder as they left the building and began to cross the grounds. It was another part of their routine. The professor would walk his student to where the car and driver waited to take the student back home after a day of studies. Recently, that had been the extent of the time they’d spent together discussing anything. It had been weeks at that point since a tea visit had been arranged. Which was incredibly odd, in Gideon’s opinion.

            “We’ve not had such a visit in some time, professor, I imagine by the time we have another we will have a great deal more to discuss than just this,” he replied knowing full well how quickly their focus on subjects and topics could change from one to the next. It was entirely possible that by the time he received an invitation to tea with the professor let alone went to attend it that they would have a completely different topic to discuss, one that had more recently caught the fascination of either of them. There were plenty of things they had never discussed in spite of planning on doing so just for the reason that their attentions had shifted. Sometimes they shifted in the week just between an invitation being received and the actual visit occurring. Or the days between the last lecture and the following visitation for tea. Not that Gideon didn’t enjoy whatever topic was brought up and discussed. Anything was better than sitting at home alone with just his books, trapped in his wheelchair or on his crutches, unable to go out like regular, healthy men his age.

            “For that, I must apologize. I have been so terribly busy with very important affairs. Though, I do believe I will be sending you an invite very soon, Gideon,” A small, knowing smile crossed the older gentleman’s face as he spoke, as though he had a very good secret that he wasn’t sharing. That was very much the truth; he did have a secret and at that moment he was not sharing. Though, he was certain he would, likely sooner than he had intended to. The secret would make the final call on when it was shared, whether or not the professor agreed with the timing. That was always how it worked, even when the secret had been shared with the professor himself.

            “I await it, Professor,” Gideon gave a bright smile to his teacher when it finally came time for them to part ways. He closed the last leg of the path to where the car was waiting with driver to assist him on his own, leaving the professor to his own business. Getting into the car required some maneuvering which he stubbornly insisted on doing himself though Jeremiah, his driver, always offered help. With a sigh and a shake of his head, the driver accepted it, just waiting to shut the door until Gideon was settled. Only after he’d shut the door behind Gideon did he move to return back to the driver’s seat. As he did, Gideon found himself looking out the window at the university, at the professor and a stranger, his brows furrowing as he wondered where the odd gentleman had come from. For there hadn’t been too many others close to the Professor when they’d parted. Had there been? In fact, the man’s appearance had been so sudden, Gideon could have sworn that he’d appeared when he’d blinked.

            Professor Singh was much less startled by the sudden appearance when he turned to find himself facing the curious gentleman. He simply gave a warm smile and started to walk as he had intended to before anyone else had appeared to join him. “I wasn’t expecting you, you know.”

            “Yes, well, I live to surprise,” came the dry answer from the stranger as he eyed the car and the blonde boy in it who was staring at them so curiously. Soon, it broke as the car turned away, putting distance and objects in their line of vision. The strange man simply shook his head and fell in step with the professor while Gideon had to ponder his own sanity as the scenery went by. Men didn’t appear in the blink of an eye, after all, even if that was what had seemed to have happened.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Please drop a review. Any thoughts on this mess so far would be helpful as I consider heading into the editing process. <3


End file.
